FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Media Contact: Debbie Freeman
(480) 965-9271
Debbie.Freeman@asu.edu
Providing Good Customer Service is Key to Surviving Down Economy
New “Science of Service” Report Provides Insight from Top Companies
TEMPE, Ariz. (Jan. 20, 2010) — The recession and the recent holiday shopping crunch have
brought further into focus the true importance of receiving good customer service. Americans
are being more careful than ever about how and where they spend their money. A new report
from the Center for Services Leadership at the W. P. Carey School of Business at Arizona
State University reveals advice from some of the top names in business on how to keep
customers happy.
“Services have become a driving force in economies around the world, with less growth
happening in products and manufacturing,” says Stephen W. Brown, executive director of the
Center for Services Leadership (CSL). “That’s why we formed the center in 1985 as a
response to the unique challenges that companies face in this arena. Some of the highestlevel executives from our member firms contributed to this new report, which is meant to be a
real guidebook on how to create and deliver valuable services and how to provide great
customer service.”
The center is now world-renowned with many big-name member firms, including Boeing,
Charles Schwab & Company, Harley-Davidson Motor Company, Hewlett-Packard Company,
Honeywell Aerospace, IBM Global Services, Marriott International, Mayo Clinic, PetSmart,
Sony Electronics, Southwest Airlines and State Farm Insurance Company.
The center’s new report “Research Priorities for the Science of Service” will be featured in
next month’s edition of the prestigious Journal of Service Research. The report is designed to
help boost both customer satisfaction and company profits. It is the result of 18 months of indepth interviews and surveys, including contributions from more than 300 executives and
academics.
“Marriott contributed to this important effort because we are committed to delivering
extraordinary service experiences for our guests,” says Julie Moll, senior vice president of
portfolio strategy and research at Marriott International, a CSL member company. “With the
world so much in flux, brand leaders must embrace new approaches to understand and
deliver on consumer values -- and to assess where it makes the most sense to invest. For
example, with the increasing impact of both social media and consumer reviews on the Web,
brand marketers have both a challenge and an opportunity to ensure that the live service
experience not only lives up to -- or exceeds -- its promise, but is also compelling and
‘buzzworthy’ enough to provide a viral push.”
Among the premises of the report is that “all businesses are service businesses” and that
services dominate the economies of advanced countries. As a result, governments, academic
institutions and businesses are calling for an increased focus on the science of service to direct
and support emerging business models.
“In the past 10 to 15 years, there has been an increase in the reliance on service business
revenues within product-based companies like Boeing,” says Joe Shaheen, director for the
Defense and Government Services division of Boeing, a CSL member firm. “The combination of
the strained market and economic conditions has provided companies with the unique
opportunity to engage and adjust, leveraging their current capabilities and focusing on the
design of customer-centric service solutions for existing and new customers. This report comes
at exactly the right time to help with these efforts.”
The full report can be found at http://wpcarey.asu.edu/csl/knowledge/research-priorities.cfm,
and more information about the Center for Services Leadership can be found at
www.wpcarey.asu.edu/csl. The Journal of Service Research published an online version of its
article on these efforts this week at http://jsr.sagepub.com/cgi/rapidpdf/1094670509357611v1.
W. P. CAREY SCHOOL OF BUSINESS
The W. P. Carey School of Business at Arizona State University is one of the top-ranked and largest
business schools in the United States. The school is internationally regarded for its research productivity
and its distinguished faculty members, including a Nobel Prize winner. Students come from 90 countries
and include more than 60 National Merit Scholars. For more information please visit wpcarey.asu.edu and
http://knowledge.wpcarey.asu.edu/.